There are more questions to be asked, more details to be recorded. But I need to get out of there. Away from him and the ugliness of the things he’s done. I turn off the recorder. Scooting my chair away from the table, I rise and start toward the door. But I stop and turn to him; there’s one more question that won’t leave me alone.
“You could have lied about it being your idea to take Wanetta with you. Why did you admit to that?”
“There are times when the punishment is less painful than the secret.” He pauses, stares hard at me, his eyes pleading with me to listen. “I know this isn’t going to end well for me. I know I’m going to jail for the rest of my life. But if you believe anything I’ve said, believe this: I’m not the person I was back then.”
“If you’re looking for absolution, you’re not going to get it from me,” I say coldly. “You’ll have to find another way to live with yourself.”
I turn my back on him and go through the door.
*
Glock follows me to my office. As I settle in behind my desk, he takes the chair adjacent.
“You look like you just lost your best friend,” he says.
“I lost something,” I tell him. “Another little piece of my faith in humanity, maybe.” I intended the words lightly, but that’s not the way they come out. “That son of a bitch has been preaching in this town for twenty years. Right under our noses. A rapist and murderer.”
“Not the first phony to grace the house of God. Not even the first murderer.”
“That’s the thing, Glock. He’s done so much for so many people. Why did he have to turn out to be a murdering son of a bitch?”
“Maybe he figured that by saving others, he could somehow save himself,” he says. “Do you think he’s lying about the kids? About tossing that lantern?”
“I don’t know. He just confessed to kidnapping and rape and attempted murder. Why stop there?”
He grimaces, gives me a moment to reel in my emotions, then hits me with a questioning look. “What do you know about this Ruth Weaver?”
“Not much. White female. Thirty-five years old.” I shake my head. “You guys come up with anything?”
“Nada. No records. No photo. Not even a driver’s license.”
“I think she’s our killer. I think she’s going after the people who brutalized her mother.”
“Powerful motive.”
“We need to put out a BOLO.”
“A lot of thirty-five-year-old white females out there.”
“Wait.” I recall my conversation with the lab technician from BCI. “There was a long hair found on Dale Michaels’s body. We don’t know if it’s from the killer or if he picked it up in the course of his day. It’s a blond hair that’s been dyed brown. Lab is working on ID’ing the donor now.”
“So now we have a thirty-five-year-old white female with brown hair.”
“It’s all we’ve got. Let’s put out a BOLO. If she’s driving without a license or proof of insurance, we might get lucky.”
“Could be using a stolen identity.”
I try not to groan. “Tell Mona and Jodie to stay on it. Tell them to search for the names Hochstetler and Weaver. First names Wanetta and Ruth. Cambria County, Pennsylvania. Nicktown. Nanty Glo. Tell them to look at everything. Blogs. Photos. Videos. News items. Whatever they can find. I’ll take anything at this point.”
“Got it.” Glock jots notes in the small pad he keeps in his uniform pocket. Without taking his eyes off the pad, he asks, “Chief, might not be a bad idea to try and smoke her out using Blue.”
“I thought of that, but there’s this pesky little detail called procedure. Could get sketchy with the lawyer, too.” I feel his eyes on mine, but I don’t look at him. I don’t want him to know I’d already seriously considered it.
“Wouldn’t be the first time cops used a witness to nab a bad guy.”
I meet his gaze and we stare at each other across the spans of my desk, our minds working over the logistics as we were considering doing something we shouldn’t be considering. “It’s a bad idea. Lots of things could go wrong.”
“On the other hand,” he says slowly, “it might be our best hope of getting our hands on Weaver. We keep it simple. Drive him back to his place and stay with him, out of sight. Make sure he’s visible. See what happens.”
“Things could go bad pretty fast, Glock. Blue could make a run for it. Weaver could take a shot at him.”
“So we put a vest on him.”
“Maybe an ankle monitor…” I pinch the bridge of my nose. “I did not just say that.”
Glock grins. “Yes, you did. Sheriff’s Department has an ankle monitor, Chief. I can run over there and pick it up.”
My smile feels like wax on my face. “You’re not making it easy to say no.”
“This woman, this Ruth Weaver, is working fast,” he says. “We know Blue is a viable target. It could work.”
I give a nod, but the decision leaves a jittery sensation in the pit of my stomach. “Put Blue back in a cell and go get that ankle monitor.” I look at my watch. “Meet me back here in an hour. I’ve got to break the news to Hoch Yoder.”
CHAPTER 27